New Age
by emily.down
Summary: Takes place right after Tomorrowland, when the excitement has dwindled and they are left alone. Peggy and Ken story.
1. Chapter 1

**1. The Night Times**

The silence was almost tangible as he made his way slowly and tiredly through the white cubicles towards the exit.

His suitcase in one hand, his hat in the other, he was treading on the hardwood floor without looking where he was going. He had memorized these small trips from the inside to the outside and vice versa. They were identical in every way.

He felt he needed a drink. His head was buzzing for something wet and soft. A smile tugged at his lips as he realized his wife would be waiting for him with a bottle of champagne.

He saw a shaded light in front of him. He realized he was standing in front of Peggy's office.

She was sitting on her couch, her back at him, holding what looked like a drink in her hand. She looked slightly defeated from that position.

He knocked on her door, feeling uneasy for some reason.

'Peggy?'

She turned to face him with a quick smile gracing her roughly-shaped features. Her eyes were red with exhaustion.

'Ken, what are you still doing here? It's late.'

'I was just checking to see how you were doing. I was actually heading out,' he said, pointing towards the exit.

Peggy nodded distractedly.

'I'm fine, just having a drink before I pack my stuff and head home. I...don't feel like moving from this couch, though,' she confessed.

Ken smiled his wholesome smile.

'I know the feeling. I would have fallen asleep on my desk if Harry hadn't warned me,' he said, chuckling.

'Today was so eventful, in a good way. Yet I feel really tired.'

'Have you eaten anything?' Ken asked, tilting his head.

'I wolfed a sandwich some minutes ago.'

'No wonder,' Ken said knowingly, 'you need to put some food in that tiny body of yours.'

Peggy laughed in her serious fashion.

'I probably should. Boy, today was full of surprises, wasn't it?' she repeated.

'Yeah, one too many actually,' Ken admitted, grinning sheepishly.

'What was most surprising though was how one surprise toppled the other. One minute you thought you had done something really meaningful, and the next you were trying to remember how to say 'congratulations',' Peggy continued, sipping from her glass.

Ken's smile cracked slightly, but remained faithfully plastered on his cheeks.

He knew exactly what she meant.

He thought of praising her again for her amazing work today, but he had done that all morning and he was starting to run out of adjectives and exclamation marks. And it would have been inappropriate to say congratulations, now that she had tied that word with something completely different.

They had been so happy one minute ago, now Peggy was in her world again.

'I mean you were in there too, right? I'm not the only one feeling like something went wrong,' she continued, looking up at him in hope.

Ken was stuck. He had no idea what to say. He desperately wanted to agree. He wanted to tell her he found the idea of Don remarrying rather insipid and stupid, but he had no real reason to voice such harsh opinions. He hadn't been bothered by the fact that they had not received the proper attention.

Maybe he was settling for too little. He frowned.

'I think...I think we did something really meaningful, Pegs. And the rest just doesn't matter that much,' he finally said, feeling safe with his answer.

Peggy's face fell into a smile. It was her way of acknowledgement. She rearranged her skirt and set the glass on the table.

'You're right,' she said, getting up. 'I'm just being drunk right now.'

Ken was slightly taken aback by her statement, although he had learnt to expect such expressions from her. It was just always unnerving how she pulled one out in the middle of a bland conversation.

Peggy was all politeness and formality, until she got you alone in her office, when you had to pay attention to her words. Then you realized she was detached from normality.

Ken stepped in cautiously.

'Do you want some help or...?'

'Don't be silly, Ken. I'm finished here. I'll just get my purse. You go ahead.'

Ken nodded his head and smiled again, filling the void of words.

He stood at the door though, waiting for her to pack. An instinct of his was telling him he should at least walk her out.

Peggy didn't seem to notice he was standing there at first, but then she took note and stopped fumbling with the lock on her drawers and instead grabbed her briefcase swiftly and walked past him.

'How's Cynthia by the way?' she asked as a way of thank you for waiting.

'Oh, she was really happy when she heard about the Popsicle account. She practically started shouting on the phone. I'm still deaf in one ear,' he said, pointing at it in sadness.

'Oh, that's great, she must be really proud of you,' Peggy said, grinning bluntly.

'She'd better. I told her, of course, it was all you and that we couldn't have done it without you,' he said, patting her shoulder.

'Oh, stop it. She doesn't need to hear that,' she said, waving her hand, but feeling secretly proud.

'Are you kidding me? Of course she does. I'm sure she wants to name our first kid after you now,' Ken joked, looking down at the soles of his brown shoes. They looked dirty, for some reason.

'That would be a punishment for the girl,' Peggy replied.

'And the boy too,' Ken added, laughing.

They had reached the entrance hall. Ken opened the door for her. She slipped past him like a harried bird.

He watched her as she stood in front of the elevator expectantly, her shoulders hovering over her own shadow, as if she was trying to swallow herself.

He felt a strange feeling in the pit of his stomach, something rare and despicable. Pity.

'Listen, Pegs, my wife and I were wondering...well, actually, I was wondering if you'd like to join us for dinner on Saturday. We both want to celebrate the account with you. If you want to, that is.'

'Saturday? Dinner?' she asked, slightly confused. 'Ken that's incredibly thoughtful of you, but I can't put you out like that.'

'Nonsense! I wouldn't have asked you if you did. We'd love to have you over. Cynthia is curious about you.'

'Really?' Peggy asked surprised.

Ken silently admitted to himself that it was a lie. Cynthia barely knew Peggy. In fact, she had been confused when he had told her about her on the phone. But he was sure Cynthia would adore Peggy.

'She's about that with everyone, very curious. But she'd love it if you came, I know it,' he said, smiling warmly.

Peggy looked at the buttons on the panel slightly disgruntled. She was about to refuse him gently, but at the last minute, she turned around and flashed him a smile.

'Sure, why not?'

'Great. It's a date then,' he said, grinning from ear to ear in the same satisfied fashion in which he sealed deals with clients.

The elevator doors opened. They both stepped in quietly and let the silence take over the air again, just as it had before they had met that evening.


	2. Chapter 2

**2. I Love Lucy**

Later on, he remarked with sincerity when he was once again alone in his bathroom, that he had meant for her to forget the invitation. Not _forget_ forget, but something close to it, only slightly more pleasant and less burdensome.

The fact of the matter was that people were likely to forget any form of social agreement when faced with their personal dilemmas and Ken had hoped this would be the case.

Not because he didn't like Peggy. Heck, the whole office adored her – in the way you'd adore a piece of wholesome cake or a stumpy Labrador, following you everywhere with wise eyes.

But let's face it – a Saturday evening dinner with her and his wife didn't sound at all natural and comforting, it would be a bizarre and frightful experience of half-remembered work stories and jokes that had gone stale around the office.

And what he truly hated was to look like a moron in front of Cynthia. No, scratch that. that would be fine if he could pull off a charming, _funny_ moron, but he didn't want to look like a bore. That was even more despicable than being a moron.

I mean wasn't Sterling the biggest, most successful and appealing moron of his dying age?

Well, this was the new age and he had to pull every string in his body to impress Cynthia and keep her in love. It wasn't like in the old days when a man's silly sideways chatter would melt her heart. New age meant new age. No more turning around walls for hiding a cough of weakness, no more struggling with dirty puns stolen from The Funnies and no more pressing your hands over your tummy in masculinity, you had to go all the way out and make her think of you day and night without being anything else but clean and suave.

He wouldn't be able to achieve this with Peggy Olson standing idly in his apartment, gazing pensively into the ornamental mirrors he had set up in the small hallway to give it a sense of depth.

Cynthia would only see another crack of himself exposed in the crude living-room light. Peggy represented a place where he was never happy or free, only excited about all sorts of nothings most of the times. And Peggy herself was an unhappy, complex mess of unsolved little issues that would burst out on the table and just dry out the atmosphere.

Sure, she was an interesting girl _here_, in the office. But on a Saturday evening, in someone else's house? She would be dull and sad and pathetic and she would reveal a part of him that he was fighting back into his youth.

But she hadn't forgotten. Peggy Olson hadn't forgotten about Saturday, either way.

He had come to find this out in one of the most terrible lunch conversations of his last ten years.

He had gone into one of the kitchenettes, not feeling in the mood for a long and careful walk downtown into the pouring sun to sit at a terrace and stuff himself with gravy-coated chips. He was eating quietly in a corner, not really sitting down, just leaning casually against a sideboard, almost as if he was about to finish up and run off on some errand, when she walked in, carrying a very sanitized bag which was currently strangling three slim sandwiches, rolled up into one big heap of bread.

She sat down at the oval table in the middle and began fumbling with the bag in a way which obliged him to turn around and look at her. Not because she had asked him to do it, or because she'd thrown him some desperate sign she needed company during lunch, but because you had to look up at a person making noise when you were supposed to be in a trance, in your perfect corner of the room. You were supposed to look like someone had surprised you. Otherwise it would look strange.

'Oh, Pegs, didn't see you there,' he said, lying through his teeth.

'Hey, Ken. Just came in to wolf down my lunch,' she replied, her voice edging on an apologetic tone. 'Tough day?'

'Why do you ask? Do I look defeated or something?' he asked as a joke.

'No, but you're standing there in a very...defensive manner. Right there in the corner,' she explained clumsily, as if she was willingly trying to feel uncomfortable.

He could tell by her position that she was tired and yes, uncomfortable. Not because of him. She was the small, sweet apple in Don's eye and Don had taken a day off today to take Megan - well, he didn't know where exactly, but did it matter? The point was, Don taking off like a teenager around town with the girl of his dreams felt like the last nail hammered into the failure of her achievements.

'Defensive? Quite the contrary. I'm all open. That's why I'm sitting in the corner, so anyone can have his way at me,' he explained cheerfully. He loved being able to talk like a writer, even though he hadn't written in a while.

'That's a good attitude, I suppose,' Peggy replied wanly. 'Healthy too.'

She bit down on her sandwich and that's when he noticed she wasn't wearing any lipstick. The thing with Peggy was – she rarely wore any actual lipstick, so it wasn't a rare sight to see her natural, moist lips in full view, but somehow, he felt a bit sick at the sight of them.

He liked a woman covered in lipstick. It was like a pair of stockings hiding some unfortunately thick legs no one wanted to see. It covered a woman up, but it didn't completely seal her off from view. It hid the vulnerable, dirty, overused flesh of her lips in a fresh, calm and endearing sensuality, much like a raincoat hanging on the shoulders of a naked woman.

The feeling of sickness was enhanced by the fact that Peggy's lips, beyond being bare, were also the lips of a frustrated thinker. Bitten to the last infernal drop of blood. All curiosity vanished from them.

'So, did you watch last night on _I Love Lucy_?'

Peggy looked up in surprise. Ken had just asked her a question about television. She had to stop and gather her thoughts into a clear shape. He must have meant the reruns. Because the show had ended a while ago. He knew that, didn't he?

She arched her eyebrows. Was she supposed to tell him that? Was she supposed to go along? She wondered how he lived sometimes.

'Guess I must have missed it,' she replied with a deep sense of uneasiness, 'I don't remember a thing. But once you've seen one episode, you've seen them all.'

She hadn't meant that to sound derisive, she'd just hoped he'd realize the show had ended a while ago and that there was no point in focusing on one episode, because the entire series was memorable as a whole. Lucy _was_ a whole woman. Why was he cutting her up in episodes?

She shook her head. She was overanalyzing again. She was horrible. What did this have to do with women or Ken? She was just being silly. Ken was just being normal. It's normal to talk about episodes.

Ken glanced down at his sandwich then back up at her and then averted his gaze between the sandwich and her because he just didn't know what to do with his eyes, now that his hands were full.

Why, he wondered? Why would she say something like that? He was trying to make polite conversation and distract her from other pressing matters, but she was throwing him off with lines like that.

'Well, if you missed it, you missed a good one,' he said, half-heartedly.

_The reruns, he must mean the reruns_, she kept repeating in her head.

_No, he probably thinks it's happening now. _

'Oh, really? What was it about?'

He opened his mouth gladly, excited at the prospect of narrating something more substantial than just profit figures. He was about to begin in a very funny way, the way Lucy would talk and make faces and he would add his own phrases to punctuate a style he was trying out, but at the last moment, he faltered and his open mouth felt the income of the cold, room air, hitting his teeth like spit.

He had forgotten the episode. Complete blank. He couldn't remember a single darn thing. Oh, he could remember laughing and chuckling and he could remember something about Lucy's husband shouting in desperation at her while Lucy just sat there, quietly making fun of him to the audience, but that wasn't really relevant to the episode.

'Something about Lucy's husband getting riled up again,' he finally breathed out, coughing.

'Oh, he tends to get riled up sometimes,' Peggy commented. 'But Lucy has her charm and you can't help but think he should be laughing, not getting angry.'

Ken nodded in agreement. Sure, he would have wanted loads of 'riled up' men to laugh instead of shout.

'How's the day going for you?' he suddenly asked, as if he wanted to get the conversation done even if they had barely said a thing to each other.

'Pretty well. I got a call from a friend inviting me to a party and my team and I are rethinking some ideas we've been working on before we present them...' she trailed off.

He knew she had meant to mention Don but she had stopped at the last moment. He felt grateful for that. He had something to latch on.

'A party, eh? Would do you some good, Pegs. You look like you need to have some fun in you.'

Peggy smiled sharply, as if someone had pinched her suddenly and she glanced at him warmly, which was unexpected. He realized it wasn't what he had said, it was how he'd said it. He had sounded like the nicest brother or grandfather a woman could have.

'I mean,' he continued, shaking his head, 'every time I see you you're either here or there, working, worrying, stressing yourself out, wearing yourself down.'

He hadn't meant to ramble this far, but he'd said that too.

Peggy squinted her eyes at him. 'I'm worrying myself thin too.'

For a moment he didn't understand her playful tone but she pointed at her barely touched sandwiches and he laughed, although it wasn't all that funny.

'Geez, I'm sorry, you probably want to eat and...'

'That's not what I meant, Ken,' she said quickly, waving her hand and laughing.

There was a pause. She started tracing nail-lines on the table. Only then did he realize what she had meant.

'You don't feel like eating?' he asked in a casual tone.

She nodded her head briefly, but then took another sharp bite of her sandwich.

'But I'm doing it anyway, cuz that's how we survive. And I can't afford to be malnourished around my guys,' she said, smiling wistfully.

Somehow, the words 'malnourished' and 'my guys' clashed in his ears, like the chorus of an overused jazz love song.

'Or around anyone else, you know,' he added softly.

'Yeah, you gotta feed yourself and keep strong,' she said, making a gesture of triumph with her fist.

'Well, around here you gotta wet yourself too,' he joked, alluding to alcohol.

Peggy wrinkled her nose confused.

'Oh, Jesus no – I meant drinking, not peeing!' he quickly corrected her impression.

Peggy sucked in a breath and started laughing.

Her laugh was always like a gift you'd just received but you didn't feel like opening and ruining the surprise so you just kept playing with the strings of the package.

In other words, it was bottled up, but the bottle was nice.

And he found it pleasant and he started laughing too, almost like an encouragement or an echo.

'I almost forgot,' she said at length, breaking the last waves of laughter, 'Ken, what should I bring on Saturday?'

And that's how Ken realized she had not forgotten.

He was cornered in the corner of a room and his only weapon was his nonchalance, while he tried to feel less stupid about someone as plain and normal and nice as Peggy.

'Geez, what do you mean _bring_ something? We're not a charity house, we'd just like to have you over, don't even trouble yourself,' he replied, a little louder than intended.

Ken closed the bathroom cabinet and sighed. That's how it had happened. And now it was Friday night and he was standing in the bathroom, looking for any white hairs and massaging the line of his wrinkled eyes as if he had just woken up instead of going to bed, thinking that tomorrow he'd have to have her over and feel just awful.

He looked up at the air vent and the sheer dark emptiness inside. The wired bars prevented him from seeing too much but he guessed it was pretty damn uncomfortable in there and he suddenly felt dizzy at the thought of being trapped there.

And then out of nowhere, the door popped open and Cynthia's head appeared. She was pretty and silky in her petticoat and her bronze hair pulled back over one shoulder looked like the feet of a marble statue.

'Hon, you coming to bed or are you going to stand there all night grooming yourself?'

And at the idea that she thought he was spending his time making himself look fine in the mirror, he couldn't help but recall the bottled up laughter.

He started laughing like an unopened gift, like Peggy Olson.


End file.
